


Just Another Queen in Love

by orphan_account



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Future Fic, Gen, Love Story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-04
Updated: 2014-11-04
Packaged: 2018-02-24 02:53:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2565662
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Felicity and Oliver's son, Tommy has been in love with Sara Diggle for his entire life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Another Queen in Love

Tommy Queen was 13 when he realized he was in love with Sara Diggle.

He was sitting at the kitchen counter one morning, waiting expectantly for the bowl of cereal his mom was pouring milk into as he offhandedly listened to his parents conversation.

“If we’re going to go out with Lyla and Digg tonight, we need to find someone to babysit—i mean, hangout with Tommy tonight,” Felicity quickly corrected herself at the look Tommy shot her, sliding over the bowl of cereal in front of her son.

“What about Sara?” Oliver asked, unfocused as he made a large marking on the newspaper in front of him, sliding it across the counter to Felicity before Tommy could see it. Felicity studied it silently a moment with a slight raise of her eyebrows, before nodding a bit and tucking the paper into the garbage in the cabinet in front of her.

“She has a date tonight,” Felicity smiled, excited, but watched as both of her boys bloated in anger.

“She’s way too young, how is Digg okay with—”

“Sara doesn’t like anybody! Who is she—”

Tommy and Oliver began protesting in sync, before Felicity yelled over them.

“Hey now! We are excited for Sara—this is her first real date and Lyla says he’s a nice boy. Or, at least, the background check she did turned up good. Oliver, she is not too young, she’s 16 for goodness sakes. And Tommy, I don’t know who he is, but I’m sure he’s great if our Sara likes him,” Felicity looked at them both scoldingly.

“Now, eat,” She instructed them both firmly, gesturing to the food in front of them.

Tommy had to hangout that entire night with Grandma Smoak, watching some old HBO rerun while she made weird jokes about the main actor he didn’t understand, but Tommy paid little attention. All he could think about was that some stupid high school boy was eating dinner with his Sara. He didn’t like it—even at 13, when his life revolved around comic books, action figures, and conning his parents into pizza every night for dinner, he didn’t like it one bit.

****

Tommy was every bit the playboy his father was in high school, or at least that’s what his family alluded at as they shared stories of Oliver’s wild ways at holidays. His Aunt Thea told Tommy stories about Oliver’s constant stream of girls in his early years, although it was hard to imagine his dad interested in anybody else with the way he looked at Felicity. 

Tommy’s charm though, during his freshman year of high school, came from both of his parents, and was genuine instead of selfish; his reputation among girls unintentional. He didn’t mean to use the girls he was with—he honestly found them captivating at first—but he lost interest quickly, his mind always wandering from the girl of the week to the dark, smiling beauty that he would rather be spending his time with.

Tommy got his smarts from his mother, and during the year they both attended Starling City High he tutored Sara in math and the days of her babysitting little Tommy Queen were left in the past. Spending so much time together, the age difference seemed to matter less. They began to hangout without their parents persuasion. They became best friends.

Tommy made his way out to her car after school one day, faltering a moment as he watched Sara give a languid kiss to her boyfriend, Chase, before he parted, hitting Tommy roughly with his shoulder as he walked past.

“God, he’s a dick,” Tommy commented to Sara, who rolled her eyes.

“He was being friendly. It was a friendly shove,” Sara said, slipping into the drivers seat and starting the car.

“I’m pretty sure he dislocated my shoulder,” Tommy whined a bit, rubbing a large, tanned hand over his shoulder, before stretching, exaggerating the injury.

He thought he saw Sara’s eyes ghost over the sliver of skin between his shirt and shorts as he stretched—Tommy had grown to almost the height of his father the past summer, and had spent long hours in their home gym in preparation of high school. He had hoped Sara would notice. In that split second, it seemed like she had, but as quickly as the thought entered his mind, her eyes slipped back to the road.

“Big Belly Burger before going home? I’m starving,” She asked lightly, with a smile that was all crinkled eyes and bright teeth,and Tommy shoved past the lingering hurt at the sight of her and Chase and smiled back, nodding as she pulled out of the parking lot. Tommy begin a ramble his mother would be proud of, and everything was as it should have been—just him and Sara. It was always so easy, being with her. Everything with her felt so natural—so undeniably right.

He spent that entire time building up the courage to tell her how he felt, but was deterred by each passing boyfriend she had. In the end, they parted as simply best friends, with her completely oblivious and he a mouth full of unspoken words. She went to a university fifteen long hours away and he began his sophomore year.

He tried to move on—he really did. But everything came back to Sara’s laugh. The way she would put a hand on his arm while she was talking about something exciting—the little wrinkle between her eyebrows that formed when she was thinking. The mischievous glint that would spark in her eyes when she had an idea that always proved to get them both into trouble. 

None of the girls he met wiped away those memories despite how much he wished they would, and he lived for the phone call that came every Thursday night, whether or not he had found another girl to replace the last yet. The phone call always came at the same time, and it was always the best part of his week. 

One week though, Sara’s call came after an hour of Tommy anxiously checking his phone—she had been at a study group. She was sorry she forgot to tell him about it—it wouldn’t happen again.

Two weeks later, she couldn’t call at all. She had a huge test to study for, and had to focus. Tommy understood—she was studying to be a doctor, after all. It was hard work.

A month later, they were in the middle of their call when Sara let out a girlish giggle, and she warned someone in the background to stop tickling her. A deep voice sounded muffled words behind her, and Sara told Tommy in a laughing voice she had to go. 

When she hung up, Tommy got wasted for the first time in his life and woke up the next morning passed out on his porch with his parents glaring down at him and no memory of how he got there. His dad gave him a stern look, and his mom yelled for over an hour. He apologized. 

It was sincere at the time, but as the phone calls from Sara stopped, the nights he was drunk began to outnumber the nights he wasn’t. 

During the day, at school, he focused intently on his studies—letting it fill his mind. His parents were proud—he was Ivy League bound with his grades.

School nights he did everything from Student Council to football—he did every extracurricular he could fit in.

On the weekends when he was out of school work to focus on and clubs to partake in, Tommy smiled with his friends, a girl on his arm and a drink in his hand.

Each girl was different and none of them mattered. Tommy wasn’t moving on—he was staying busy. He wasn’t forgetting—he had tried at first, but it never had worked. 

In the small moments between the bustling activity that was his life he missed Sara. It hit him a random moments—a heavy weight on his chest as he voiced a joke that nobody else got, smelled a ghost of her perfume, or as he sat during Thanksgiving at a table with both of their families and her empty seat. Without Sara. His Sara.

***

Tommy moved past his wild side after graduation as he followed in his moms footsteps at MIT. Although he still had his fair share of fun, including one or two intentional pot brownies, the number of girls on his arm began to dwindle along with his number of drinks, and he finally found someone in his sophomore year that stood out from the monotonous crowd.

They dated for three years, him and Alice. She was a small, blonde thing, but she surprised him with her sarcastic humor and deep laughter. He thought he loved her, at one point. Thought about proposing.

“Do you still love her when she’s cranky and upset?” Felicity asked Tommy when he had come to her for advice. They sat at the same kitchen counter as years before, although this time gathered over a bowl of grapes and a little black box as they talked. Tommy thought, and he thought long and hard. He watched the way his father looked at his mother, and she back at him— the way his dad would relax at just a touch from his mother, and the way his mother would stop babbling at just a touch from him. 

Tommy found out only a month later Alice had been cheating with a professor, but he wasn’t disappointed. He realized he hated the way Alice never told him why she was cranky. So they broke up right before graduation and Tommy left with a bachelors in computers and not a glance backwards, but he kept the ring. He wasn’t sure why, at the time, but he just couldn’t let it go. He realized later the ring was never for Alice after all, but for someone else. Someone he had never forgotten.

***

“You’re coming home next weekend, right?” Felicity begged on the phone to her son, and he tried not to roll his eyes as she began a long winded explanation, despite him having just told her how he was about to board his plane.

“Your Aunt Thea is throwing a huge birthday party for the twins. And I mean, huge. I thought Roy would’ve put a stop to the whole ordeal, but he just watches her buzz around with a stupid smile on his face at her crazy enthusiasm. And now she’s sucking Lyla and I into her whirlwind of cake tasting, decorations, and guest lists! It’s absolutely nuts! You would think it was a wedding, not their fifth birthday.”

“Mom, I have to get off the phone,” Tommy cut, smiling into the receiver at her exuberance, “I’ll talk to you later okay—”

“Do you know if Sara’s coming honey? I heard that she was coming back to Starling City for a bit—apparently her and Derek broke up. Figures. They moved in together after only a month! That’s just too soon to know if you’re supposed to be with somebody! Look at your father and I—we didn’t even go out on our first date until two years after we had met! I mean the circumstances were different, but—”

Tommy tuned his mother out after he mentioned Sara. They somehow hadn’t talked in years, always on alternating schedules or attending different events. The pain had ebbed substantially for Tommy, although sometimes, every once in a while, he would wonder if her laugh was still the same. So carefree and lighthearted, the way it was that summer before she left. He wondered if her hair was still short, always curling in every direction. He wondered how she was, and if she missed him sometimes too.

“Mom, I don’t know,” Tommy said exasperatedly, not delaying her in the slightest.

“Well why not? You two still talk don’t you? I mean not as much as before—you guys were just the most adorable kids when you were little. You always were hanging by her side, tagging along. You were smitten with her, completely. It was adorable. It would just kill me if you didn’t talk anymore,”

Tommy felt a flush creep over his face over the reminiscent of his childhood crush, but felt guilty at the tone of his mother’s voice,

“Yes, we still touch base every once in awhile with each other. I’ll be home for the party, I have to go mom! Love you!” Tommy said quickly into the phone before hanging up before his mom could continue talking.

Tommy had been in Europe the entire year after graduation, traveling on his own for the first time in his life. He went to Paris, London, Rome, Prague—everywhere. It was refreshing, really, to travel alone. To be able to lose yourself in the cities and cultures. But he missed his family. He missed his friends. It was time to go home.

***

Annie was tugging incessantly on Tommy’s arm the whole night, as five year olds do, and as much as he tried to act annoyed by it, he couldn’t help the constant smile on his face.

Little Annie was her mother from head to toe, all dark eyes and mischief, and she delighted in Tommy’s fake outrage at his tag-along.

“Annie, your mom keeps bugging me about meeting a nice girl—how am I supposed to do that when you’re always with me! You’re too pretty little Annabel, no other girl will even walk up to me!” Tommy teased a delighted giggle out of her, leaning down so they were face to face.

“You don’t need no other girls Tommy, you got me! For forever!!” Annie declared, grasping his large hand in her own.

“Well, in that case,” Tommy tugged her hand, “Let’s go get some more cake and fatten my girl up a bit!”

Annie giggled as Tommy patted her stomach and jabbered in his ear, but he stopped listening as his blue eyes met a pair of dark brown ones across the room.

She was smiling down at Annie’s twin, Robbie, and Tommy marveled at how familiar that smile was to him. Her hair was long now, all black waves and sleek— so unlike the uncontrollable mane he had known. Her dark skin glowed against the gold dress adorned on her small body, a small slit up the side.

Tommy watched as she let out a loud laugh and Robbie tugged on her dress, talking up to her. She leaned down, planting a swift kiss on his forehead.

“TOMMY! ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME?” Annie’s voice shouted up at him suddenly, loud enough for everyone around him to turn and stare. Including…

“Tommy?” Sara’s voice echoed across the room, “Tommy!” she confirmed, eyes lighting up as she almost jogging towards him, wrapping him in a hug. She smelled the same, too, he noticed. Vanilla, with just a hint of something fruity.

“Sara,” he sighed into her hair, holding her tight. This was what he had missed most. Sara.

When they pulled away, they stayed in each other’s arms a beat too long, staring at each other. 

“Can we talk?” Sara asked, glancing around them nervously. Lyla, Digg, Oliver, and Felicity all stood, watching the scene. Lyla and Felicity shared a relieved look and a small smile, tipping their drinks to each other. Oliver and Digg shot confused looks between their wives and the reconciled friends, not quite catching on.

Tommy ignored their nosy parents, nodding and grabbing Sara’s hand, tugging her outside onto Aunt Thea’s porch. Sara walked over to the railing, leaning over the edge a bit and looking up at the dark sky. Tommy followed suit, watching her though instead of the stars as she collected her thoughts.

“How was Europe?” she asked in an effort at casualty.

“Cold,” he answered shortly, giving her a look. It had been almost 8 years since that last summer together. He wasn’t there, on that porch with her for small talk. Not in that moment. In that moment—he needed answers.

Because he had had everything and then nothing. She had made him feel all that was wonderful in the world, and then a grief that was incomparable. She came into his life like the sun, and left a trail of burns in her wake. And he knew that she had heard of his spiral after she left—their parents were insufferable gossips. Sara was smart—she had to know it wasn’t a coincidence. He had loved her more than life, and when she left it felt like she had taken his.

“I’m sorry I never called,” was the apology she chose, finally tearing her eyes away from the sky to meet his face, “I’m sorry I never asked how you were doing. I’m sorry I never tried. I wish I had.”

Tommy stared at her as she stepped closer, but made no moves back. He had finally gotten to the point in his life where he could think about other things, besides her. Where he could go an entire day without that pang in his chest—and then, there she was. In the flesh. And he hated how easy it was to feel again.

“I had to move on Tommy—you get that right?” She pleaded, grabbing his hands, “I knew how you felt Tommy. And I’m so sorry I hurt you, but it wasn’t right for us Tommy,” each word hit Tommy like an icepick, despite her genuine tone.

I knew how you felt Tommy.

He felt a rage like no other fill him.

“You knew? You knew that I loved you and you said nothing? You let me believe, all these years, that I let you walk away without ever knowing—you left me with hope Sara,” Tommy yelled, “And that hope almost destroyed me. If you would’ve just told me that you didn’t have feelings for me, I could’ve moved on instead of holding onto this…idea…”

He raked a hand through his hair in exasperation, trying to move away from her and distance himself, but she stepped even closer to him.

“I did have feelings for you, you idiot!” Sara yelled over him, “That was the problem! I did! Tommy, I did! Even though you were only a freshman, and I was leaving for college I did. I had known you my entire life. You should have felt like a little brother to me—but you didn’t. You didn’t Tommy, and that’s why I had to leave. I was leaving for college and you had just started high school. We both needed to learn how to live our lives. It wasn’t the right time for us Tommy. It never was.”

Sara’s voice went solemn at the end and she finally turned her penetrating gaze away from his, her breathing fast as she looked out over the railing.

He studied her, shocked by her omission. 

Because she was right, it hadn’t been the right time for them. Not then. 

“It is now,” Tommy declared into the darkness of the night, and although he wasn’t sure if that was true, he did know that he couldn’t wait any longer. 

So despite thefact that that his parents were probably eavesdropping from the door behind them, Tommy cupped Sara’s cheek, pulling her lips up to his and kissing the only woman he had ever truly loved.


End file.
